Project-Based Learning -- Ideas for How to Do It with CCSS and NGSS

I argue that effective science and STEM programs require Project-Based Learning (PBL). Of course, that’s my opinion about effective education in general. As education leaders rethink science programs and consider building STEM programs, the process should free you from the prison of bare content coverage (meaning devoid of a context, or content for content’s sake). In the NRC Science Framework or NGSS, for example, the learning structure emphasizes connecting content to science and engineering practices and to big ideas in science (three-dimensional learning). Important content becomes a tool for building the skills to understand the world and solve problems, not an end in itself. PBL is a framework for taking science content, practice and understandings and applying them to meaningful community problems that will meaningfully engage students. Combining these ideas is educational matrimonial bliss.

Back when I worked at CESA 2, I conducted a workshop on PBL (with science, math and literacy connections). The slides are here.  Here are a few thoughts on understanding and implementing PBL:

First, you really need to define it - What is PBL? 

As a school, district, or individual, if you’re working to implement PBL, you need a consistent, definition. There are a lot of names for PBL, which makes things confusing. I personally don’t think it really matters what you call it (problem, project, challenge, inquiry, ...); it just matter what you do. I like this list of questions to assess whether it’s just another project or PBL.

Some will need justification - Why do PBL?

Because students love it! That’s really all the justification anyone should need, but students love a lot of things that won’t move their education forward, so it’s clearly not enough. Research suggests that PBL increases long-term retention, better engages students and teachers, and develops critical thinking skills. I saw these effects in my classes.

So, how do I implement it?

I created a template to structure the steps in setting up a PBL unit (I also have a template that describes each of the sections). The steps are…

1) First, you lay the groundwork. Determining the phenomenon/community issue you’re going to explore becomes part of a cyclical process of determining your understandings and essential questions, along with what students will know and be able to do. With a lens of three-dimensional learning, the content and skills will be intertwined and inseparable.

2) In considering the skills and content knowledge that students will gain, projects can clearly connect to math, literacy and science (along with engineering and technology). In particular, the skills espoused in each have vast overlaps.  PBL should include all disciplines because work that we do in life connects all of the disciplines. A new town retention pond has to be mathematically and scientifically sound, it has to be written up and communicated well, it needs to meet codes and regulations, and it often has to be aesthetically pleasing within a park setting.  In elementary schools integrated units are frequently going away as set curriculum programs require certain amounts of time in isolated disciplines. That will have to change in order to experience the benefits of PBL. 

3) At some point in my workshops on PBL (and science generally), I like to have the group go on a walk through the school and/or neighborhood. If you look carefully, there are potential projects all around the school:  recycling, prairies, gardens, local streams or retention ponds, playgrounds, community centers, graffiti, alternative energy, ecosystems, seasonal changes, traffic flow, sports and safety, politics, drones, diabetes and healthy eating, constitutional rights, etc., etc.  Many online sites also have ideas, such as this database.

4) Assessing PBL requires moving beyond typical paper/pencil tests. With content and skills inextricably linked, assessments will likewise need to look at the connection of student ability and understanding. Can they find the density of multiple chemicals to help describe which ones would be best suited for cleaning an oil spill? I also like the idea of students involved in the goal setting and assessment. Some self and peer assessment examples can be found here, here, and here, performance assessment ideas here, rubric ideas here and here, and possible digital portfolios here. I have really liked having experts come in to be part of the assessment process as well—such as listening to presentations, and judging science or cultural fairs. Experts could really be helpful in project design and research as well. UW-Madison, as an example, has an experts database, but local communities typically have a wide variety of untapped expert resources.

5) To meet the needs of varying students and better engage them, having some elements of choice often helps. Choices could include their partners, what the product looks like, how they structure their time, the subject or topic studied, their individual goals, how they’re assessed, or dates for check-ins.  Acknowledging that some groups of students have special needs, these case studies have a lot of great ideas.

6) Managing the process can often be the biggest challenge of PBL. How do you ensure students actually finish and that they all participate? A clear timeline or calendar for the teacher and the students is an essential first step. To ensure participation, I also really like the idea of a team contract to hold students accountable. Student collaboration and participation can also be facilitated with tools like Google docs, edmodo, wikispaces, etc., which also allow for observing which students are contributing.

7) Two continual problems should be addressed explicitly within the project. First, students need specific help in finding reliable sources (ideas here and here).  Avoiding plagiarism must also be taught, discussed and penalized severely. Even in my wife’s college courses, receiving zeroes for plagiarized work and referrals to academic authorities surprised students.  

8) Building on the assessment piece, both teachers and students should have some metacognitive time to reflect on their learning. I really like this list of reflection questions for students from Edutopia.

Notably, I have received many of these resources from Edutopia and the Buck Institute for Education.

Please, let me know of any questions or comments you have on these ideas!

NRC Science Framework - Introductory Workshop Ideas

Teachers and school leaders often want a one day introduction to the landscape of new science standards. Importantly, Wisconsin's model academic standards (WMAS) in science remain the same. In consideration of science program reviews, some districts are looking to build on the WMAS with the National Research Council's Science Education Framework and the Next Generation Science Standards. A one day workshop can be the starting point for the more in depth process I outlined in my last blog post, though I think teachers would benefit from reading through the NRC Framework  beforehand (a guided book study perhaps?). I definitely do not think that groups of teachers should get a brief introduction to a new set of standards and then be left to implement a new science program in their limited PLC time. 

Here are links to the slides from some CESA 2 elementary and secondary standards workshops (note, there’s an extra unit idea at the end of the secondary slides with a HS life science focus):

Elementary workshop slides

Secondary workshop slides

When I start these workshops, I ask participants to think about their main goal(s) for their students’ science learning for the year. Because I see many teachers who get too hung up on covering the content, I want them to consider the big picture of science. I refer back to these ideas throughout the workshop, particularly when a teacher asks something like, “Why don’t they mention the stages of meiosis within these DCI’s?”

I next discuss the development of the NRC Framework and NGSS. I think it’s important to note that the NGSS were a state-led, non-federally funded effort!

We then review the structure of the standards, looking together at a page. What is this disciplinary core idea vs. topic view? How are we supposed to use the PE’s? What is a standard here? Notably, here in WI, we’ve decided that the standard is the whole page – emphasizing the practice, DCI and CCC connection. For some reason teachers rarely ask questions as we go through the structure, even though they have them (maybe it’s just a bit overwhelming). I make sure to discuss what the acronyms and numbers mean, as well as those little asterisks. I’ve found that this resource from NSTA on the three dimensions to be useful. I make sure to point out that each PE connects the three dimensions, showing the handy multi-color view provided when looking at standards on www.nextgenscience.org.  I also note that ability to get more info by clicking on almost anything on those nextgenscience.org standards pages – linking directly to the framework and the CCSS (excellent!). 

Recently, I have next been going through some of the basics of designing a unit. We first talk about interesting phenomena in the world around us. Students (particularly those not generally interested in science/math) are really engaged by talking about issues in their community or on the news now. My units that I detail a little on my slides are oil spills (ES), Near Earth Objects (MS), and the Wisconsin wolf hunt (HS). There are certainly loads of other possibilities, and at the early elementary grades students could do fairly simple phenomena like animals, people and plants in changing seasons (very appropriate in WI with a wind chill expected to be -30ish next week!).

I then imagine that I’m a teacher at a particular grading wanting to connect a unit to a particular phenomenon. I ask, does this work with the DCI’s and the PE’s designated for my grade?  I have found that interesting phenomena don’t work at every grade in K-5, but do connect within every grade band somewhere. And, they typically connect across science disciplines and build well into engineering connections.

After discussing connections to students’ background knowledge, and having some type of entry event to kick things off, we do some modeling. I emphasize that modeling is an iterative process where students create some sort of representation of their thinking. In the elementary PD, teachers draw out the basics of an ecosystem/food web at a local river. We then discuss the oil spill incident (and I’d do some background with students on what oil is). We go back to the model (drawing) of the river and create an after scene—adding an oil spill to it and asking how it would affect the ecosystem. Teachers ask, so is modeling just drawing something? No. It could be 3-D or computer-based. It should likely include some words and details. The key is that it shows student thinking before the learning activities and is used as a tool to develop and assess their thinking throughout the unit. Tools for Ambitious Science teaching has a fabulous primer on modeling.  I have teachers do this modeling in groups, as it fosters some great conversations. As a teacher I could see doing the modeling as a whole class, particularly at the beginning with lower elementary students. In the end, I would have students create the models individually to assess their learning, although I don’t have teachers do that step. 

I only describe the interim learning in brief. We do reference and read from the Engineering is Elementary unit on oil spills. It has a lot of great ideas. Many learning experiences will happen between the introductory modeling and engagement steps, and the final model creation and presentations. In the workshop, the learning activities that we actually do include creating an experimental or engineering model, and going through writing claims, evidence and reasoning.

To do a little hands-on science, we do what’s really an engineering activity. Teachers try out some sample oil spill clean up. Within the PD I ask teachers to design how to do these tests, though I’d give elementary students a bit more structure. After they model an oil spill clean-up (vegetable oil with black oil based food coloring in it put into water), we discuss the benefits and limitations of the model with this worksheet.

Next, we discuss the claims, evidence and reasoning methodology to write a good conclusion. Notably, the claim is not a hypothesis here. The claim is the beginning part of the conclusion students are writing after they’ve done the investigation. Evidence can be pictorial or written, qualitative or quantitative.

I use this CER template to guide this writing (built from work of Joe Krajcik and Eric Brunsell). 

There is some review time built in here. How can we include authentic engineering? What NGSS practices and crosscutting concepts did we use in our activities? How would you assess this work (think PE’s)? 

Teachers at this point are anxious to think about their own lessons and units. I use this worksheet to help guide those small group discussions around improving a particular lesson. I ask teachers to bring a lesson or their books to the workshop. After some review time (about 30 min depending on how engaged they are), we create a set of considerations together for what teachers should do as they review their current lessons.

I tend to think that the NGSS appendices (see the left column here) are an underutilized resource, so we jigsaw them next. When groups report out, I ask them to especially focus on how these appendices could be used by groups of teachers to support their implementation efforts. In the secondary session we discuss appendix K for quite a while, including an exploration of the pros and cons of an integrated science program. 

At this point I acknowledge that standards purists would likely prefer teachers to build units and lessons up from the standards, rather than tweaking what they already have (being practical I think both are legitimate parts of reconsidering your science instruction). We use this Understanding by Design template to map objectives for an NGSS unit (basic idea from Eric Brunsell). I review this template with ideas included to describe the unit planning process.  Within this discussion, we talk about how crosscutting concepts (CCC’s) can provide the frame for essential questions. Scientists and engineers certainly have particular lenses for looking at the world around them—these are basically represented within the CCC’s. So, I discuss how you might look at a particular phenomenon through the lens of each of the CCC’s (on my slide of ideas, I’m considering brain-eating amoeba in ponds). I credit Emily Miller with this CCC and essential question idea.

Finally, we have a little time for planning. What are you main takeaways from the day? What are your short and long terms goals? How are you going to share what you’ve learned with others within your school/district?

And, at the end of the workshop, I always offer my willingness to answer questions by email as they come up – kevin-dot-anderson-at-dpi-dot-wi-dot-gov! 

*I want to also note the great work done by Dave Bydlowski and Greg Johnson of the Wayne County RESA. Check it out here for further PD ideas.

Steps for Implementing New Science Standards

Reviewing a district science program and implementing changes to it is not a simple or straightforward process. I worry that district or school leaders might approach the change by aligning their content at each grade to new standards and adopting some new curricula. Recent research-based science guides (such as the NRC Science Framework and the Next Generation Science Standards) will take much more in-depth and ongoing professional development to use well. I've thought through some basic ideas for what teacher work time and workshops should look like as groups re-imagine their science programs. I decided to include time frames that are a bit dreamy, being beyond what districts might actually consider reasonable. Though, to do the work well, I do think teachers will need even more time than I list here. Notably, this process would take multiple years, where teachers have additional time in PLCs between the meetings detailed below to share ideas, analyze student work samples, and review progress.

1) Vision - Teams of teachers start with considering their own overarching goals for students and vision for science education in their district. It would be ideal to have parents and/or community members as part of this conversation, particularly bringing in science professionals. I don't think teachers should determine their vision for science in their community alone or solely based on the NGSS. What's important in your community?  I like this goal statement from NRC as a vision. 
*would likely take a half day

2) Basic Understanding - Teachers then receive some help in understanding the structure and intention of the new standards. Some schools might have a stellar science teacher or two who could go to some workshops/webinars, read the framework and facilitate the learning process for the other staff. For districts looking to NGSS as a guide, this CESA 2 website has some introductory PD resources, slides and activities that were developed in WI. NSTA also has fabulous webinars for understanding the NGSS.
*would take at least a half day

3) Lesson Example - Teachers want to see examples of standards-based instruction. So, next, I think teachers would benefit from being led through a hands-on lesson, where each step is linked explicitly to elements of the standards. The NRC Framework's practices and crosscutting concepts would be important to highlight in this lesson, though the way the content, practice and big ideas connect will be the critical piece (three dimensional learning). The facilitator should explicitly state his/her thinking for how/why to link these three dimensions throughout the sample lesson. Teachers could also use models and strategies for how to modify their existing lessons to address these concepts and facilitated time to try it themselves.
*would take at least a half day

4) Audit of Current Practice - Some schools make a brief review of their current practices and materials part of the process, but really introspecting on current work takes significant time. What do lessons in classrooms look like now? Do outside experts observing our practice agree with us on the level of rigor and inquiry in our lessons? Teachers need to be safe to honestly reflect on the shortcomings of their science instruction. With a solid understanding of the vision of the new science standards for instruction, they'll likely see room for improvement. In this audit stage, to get comfortable with this change, most teachers like to first map out how the content they teach will change with the new standards. I repeatedly emphasize they don't have to entirely change their content in one year! It's CRAZY to think teachers can effectively change science content and practice in a year! Seriously, nuts! Be nice to teachers and carry out this process of changing content and pedagogy over at least three years (realizing true alignment will take even more). Aim for one unit each year. This work of mapping out content and instructional practice really needs to take place within a K-12 team. If you're looking to the NGSS, the appendices provide support for this mapping process (see the left column links). Appendices J and K specifically provide secondary course mapping ideas. In this process, teachers also decide whether or not they want to pursue adoption of new curriculum (though it will likely take 3-5 years after standards are released for quality, aligned materials to be produced). Additional discussion points in a science program audit would include course sequences and offerings, resources available, school culture and community/business partnerships.
*would take 2-4+ days depending on curriculum adoption plans

5) Ongoing PD - As they begin to rethink their curriculum and pedagogy, teachers continue to build their understanding of science and engineering practices, particularly in light of their current practice. Teachers need particular help in the high leverage areas of scientific modeling (great resource - Tools for Ambitious Science Teaching) and science talk (see TERC's Inquiry Project). Considering how to differentiate instruction to engage all students in these practices certainly makes sense here.
*would take at least a half day

6) Progression of Big Ideas - The big ideas or crosscutting concepts of science will be less familiar to teachers than the practices and will need their own attending to. The process would be similar to building understanding of the practices, but the crosscutting concepts can be uniquely used to generate driving questions for unit development. "How does weather shape the world around us?" brings in cause and effect. "What happens at microscopic through macroscopic aspects of a polluted river ecosystem?" brings in ideas of scale and potentially system models. "How have societal energy sources and usage changed over time and why?" brings in energy and matter as well as stability and change. Lessons linked to the world around us offer natural differentiation tools to meet the needs of all learners. Driving questions linked to a consistent set of big ideas offer a natural means to link science learning within and across grade levels.
*would take at least a half day

7) Assessment - Assessment and the use of assessment data needs support across all curricular areas, so professional development would not have to always be science specific. The use of portfolios, notebooks, and performance-based assessments is, perhaps, more intuitive in science, and these methods could use more emphasis. It's difficult to meaningfully include the science and engineering practices or crosscutting concepts in a multiple-choice test, though I think groups like NAEP are making progress in that respect. A recent conference at ETS on science assessment brought together the top minds in the field, and many of their presentations and reports can be found online. The National Academies released a report in 2014 on linking assessment to the Next Generation Science Standards. Achieve recently published some sample secondary, performance tasks.
*would take at least a half day, with ongoing reflection on assessment results

8) Engineering - Science teachers rarely have engineering backgrounds, and the move toward STEM and real-world science instruction requires engineering connections from K-12. While many WI schools use curricular programs like PLTW and EiE, simply adopting these or similar programs isn't going to cut it. Teachers need significant time to gain an understanding of engineering and how to build engineering extensions for their science units. Again, this work needs to be done vertically so students do not test bridges and clean oil spills in grade after grade. Many great resources continue to come out to support engineering education. I particularly like all that PBS is doing with STEM!
*would take at least one day (though could be combined over many days with a district STEM initiative)

9) Interdisciplinary Connections - Particularly at the elementary level, we need to think about how to link learning across subject areas. Science teachers, like all teachers, need further support with interdisciplinary instruction. If I started a school, it would be focused on project-based learning (PBL), and I think that interdisciplinary, real-world approach is the best way to teach science (and everything!). Great PBL resources can be found from Edutopia and BIE.
*would take at least one day, particularly at the elementary level

10) Equity - In the process of rethinking science programs, a focus on all students is critical. Teachers continually ask for specific examples of how to structure their classes and lessons for differentiated learning. It's not easy! Authors of the NGSS provided some support that could be applied regardless of the standards being used in a district. Appendix D and the related case studies provide a wealth of ideas for teachers to support all of their students in meeting rigorous science standards.
*would take at least one day

11) Evaluate and Improve - Both formatively and summatively, teachers need time to reflect on these changes in practice and the effectiveness of implementation. This process should involve reviewing student products and other assessment information to consider areas for improvement. The cycle never ends!
*would take at least a half day and PLC time moving forward

Added bonus - Brian Reiser, a science education guru at Northwestern, wrote this useful article on effective science instruction and structuring professional development to improve science programs. 

What am I missing on this list?  Is it too unrealistic?  Let me know your thoughts...